April 07, 2012

Natives use humor to cope

By Alysa LandryHumor in Indian culture is used as a way to understand challenges and ease stress, Deloria wrote. One thing all tribes share is the historic trauma of being relocated, converted, labeled and exterminated. There's no end to jokes about moving the Anglos off the land and reclaiming the country.

"Indians have found a humorous side of nearly every problem, and the experiences of life have generally been so well defined through jokes and stories that they have become a thing in themselves," Deloria wrote. "The more desperate the problem, the more humor is directed to describe it."

Take, for example, jokes about Christopher Columbus, the man credited with discovering America. Or General George Armstrong Custer, the U.S. Army officer and cavalry commander who served in the Civil War, then went West to lead the nation in the wars against American Indians.

These two men bear the brunt of most American Indian jokes, Deloria said, because tribes find common ground by joking about shared experiences.

"It is said that when Columbus landed, one Indian turned to another and said, "Well, there goes the neighborhood,'" Deloria wrote. "Another version has two Indians watching Columbus land and one saying to the other, "Maybe if we leave them alone, they will go away.' A favorite cartoon ... showed a flying saucer landing while an Indian watched. The caption was "Oh no, not again.'"Comment: For more on Native-themed humor, see Satirizing Redskins with Whiteskins and Indians Need More Cowbell.